Recruiting via social media is cost-effective

When running a business, the first thing you should be thinking about is your bottom line. The average cost of replacing a new staff member is already sky-high, so why add to those figures by needlessly handing over part of your profits to a recruitment agency? Social media platforms such as LinkedIn, Facebook and Google+ are free and while initial results in terms of finding the right candidate may be slow, depending on your own social media savviness, return on investment will always be better than consulting a middle man.

You can target the kind of talent you want

Social media allows businesses to better recruit for the industry in which they are operating. You can sift through talent and filter by location, industry, degree level, or you can harness LinkedIn Groups and share relevant job opportunities with members of that group.

‘Big four’ auditing firm EY is a great example of a company which uses social media to converse and engage with its target audience in terms of talent. In this case, they use their Facebook careers page to attract promising graduates, and advertise new opportunities.

You’re more likely to attract passive candidates

Those who aren’t actively looking for a job, otherwise known as ‘passive candidates’, are unlikely to browse job listing websites and you therefore need to access them in different ways, such as through posts on your social media accounts. Passive candidates may currently be happy in their role, with a good salary, but if you advertise your workplace as a vibrant, fun place to work in and communicate that you offer attractive employee benefits, you could be selling them a role they didn’t even realise they wanted. Marriott are an example of a brand who do this particularly well. With Recruiting Times identifying up to 44% of the professional workforce as ‘passive’, this is a huge market going untapped, which you can target through paid advertisements on Facebook, direct recruiting on LinkedIn or public question and answer sessions on Twitter.

How do you use social media?

Above are just three of the ways social media can be advantageous in terms of reaching out to the talent your business is looking to attract. Have you benefitted from this method of recruiting in the past, or perhaps you have your own tips on how to use social media for more effective recruitment?

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About Small Business Can

The idea for Small Business Can comes from an Ulster Bank initiative when we went and talked to hundreds of businesspeople and asked them about the types of business supports they most valued. The majority said that they valued the insights of other businesspeople the most. We came up with smallbusinesscan.com, a site run by businesspeople for businesspeople. Read more...